What do you need? Where do you go? What is this constant whispering?

[sovay]

I must use this week to remind myself that it is not at all true that I write something and then it falls into the unrecoverable gulfs of history, because "Tea with the Earl of Twilight" has been beautifully reviewed by Anne M. Pillsworth and Ruthanna Emrys at Tor.com's Reading the Weird:

Because the necessity—the obligation—of painful knowledge is a theme woven through this story's core. Knowing hurts, and knowing is dangerous. But not-knowing doesn't make you safe either, and certainly doesn't make you a better person. Sid's haunted by Hilary's life and death, and by his fear of attackers who would have been equally dangerous to her and her lover. But even before Hilary, she's haunted by the shadow of climate change, of a future in which the sea will take back a city that she knows deeply and intimately. If you know that someday Cthulhu is going to rise and overturn all, what should you do? Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await? You can't make the problem never-was, can't return to a pre-anthropocene, pre-knowledge innocence—you have to work with the present you've got and the futures it leaves open. So this is a story about little fixes—or even just changes, getting things moving that were held in stasis—amid huge, terrifying realities that aren't going away . . . This story is gorgeous and painful, and achingly appreciated during a time when eldritch horrors sometimes come perilously close to being worse than fiction.

I had been having a rather discombobulated afternoon caused by sleeping much later than planned despite the sunlight flooding our street, but this review makes up for all of it. For the record, the three pieces of Elise Matthesen's jewelry that contributed to the fictional item in the story are the necklace-crown "Remember What You Say in Dreams #4" (silver wire, silverleaf jasper, driftglass and freshwater pearl) and the pendants "Was Ice, Am Ocean" (silver wire and labradorite) and "The Sea That Marks the Heart" (silver wire, abalone, nazar-blue seed beads). Have some links!

1. I had no idea the U.S. Navy maintains a grove of white oaks strictly for repairs of the USS Constitution, but I am delighted to find out. I like that it is a conservation project, too.

2. Both environmentally and aesthetically, I love the underwater museum of Paolo Fanciulli.

3. I didn't know Climate Mayors existed, either, but I am glad to hear that Boston's own Marty Walsh has just been named chair of the coalition. Because we have tides like this. And so I write the stories I do.

Comments

[lauradi7dw]

Surprised to see that I got to comment about something bell history adjacent before
Choco_frosh, but he's probably working or something. When the bells at Old North were hung on a new frame in 1983, the historical preservation people insisted that the new frame be oak, instead of replacing it with the now-commonplace metal frame. The plans that the foundry sent called for oak that was thicker than one could commonly get, but somehow (I don't know the negotiating details), we got to use the Charlestown Navy yard's designated stash for the frame members. Ed Levin, of blessed memory, a founder of the Timber Framers guild of America (later of public TV Nova trebuchet fame), put the frame together.

[pameladean]

What a lovely, perceptive review!

As for the Navy, WOW. I would like to see "the largest contiguous forest under single ownership in Indiana."

P.

[gwynnega]

A beautiful review!

[anna_wing]

I'm told that the Imperial Household Agency in Japan maintains several ancient stands solely to provide material for repairs to various palaces and shrines under its charge.

[cmcmck]

Makes me wonder where they source the oak for repairs on HMS Victory.

[ashlyme]

Fanciulli's museum - wow. He deserves a medal. Preferably in old coral and seaglass. No wonder you love the place so.

I love that review so much. This line particularly got to me: "Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await?" And the mention of "little fixes"; I couldn't help thinking of "Little Fix of Friction" too. And being compared with Aickman is a Damn Good Thing.

[julian]

In Indiana, of all places! Very interesting. Thank you.

[tree_and_leaf]

I have just read both the review and your story, which I had missed until now, and it's going to haunt me. Especially as it unexpectedly turned out to involve a city I live near....

[selkie]

I’m still so, so very pleased by this review. One for the scrapbook.

[asakiyume]

Oh, I thought I'd responded here! Your photos of the tides were impressive in the ominous way of all climate-change-influenced photos--I think I pointed my oldest at them, since he is often walking in those areas on weekends.

That really is a beautiful review: "So this is a story about little fixes ... amid huge, terrifying realities that aren't going away." My heart aches. (It aches perpetually these days.)